Lecture 3: Typography and Utopia/ Dystopia
Utopia/ Dystopia
- Utopia comes from the Greek words ou, meaning “no” or “not,” and topia, meaning “place”
- Utopia mean a place that we can only dream about, a true paradise
- Dystopia, which is the direct opposite of utopia, is a term used to describe a utopian society in which things have gone wrong
- Both utopias and dystopias share characteristics of science fiction and fantasy, and both are usually set in a future in which technology has been used to create a better and perfect living conditions. Also the psychology and emotions of the characters who live under such conditions (Lois.L, 2016)
Dystopia depicts a desperate future of a community that full of peace on the surface, but the inner is filled with a variety of ills that is out of control, such as class conflict, resource shortages, crime, persecution, industrial revolution and the negative side of technology.
Despite using science and technology to better our lives, we are the real slaves to technology (Singyin.L ,2013)
If base on technology, dystopia describes the material civilization is above the spiritual civilization, psychological dependence on substances, human lives in a highly developed technological society but without freedom.
Fritz Kahn is an artist who used illustrations to show the relationship between human and technology, raise people’s curiosity for the sciences and anthropology. Fritz Kahn work presented the utopian of society; he visualized the structure and function of the human body in a very unique way; many of his work explored the inner machinery of the human body, using metaphors of modern industrial life. He tuned the human body to a factory with different machines in detail, depict people worked like a machine and slave in their life in the 1920s metaphorically.
Just like nowadays, the tension between human, nature and technology become more complicated. There is a term ‘Technology Addiction’ uses to describe people who is addicted to smartphones, tablets and notebooks; people have something electronic on hand or beside them 24h/7days, technology becomes part of our life; internet is all over the world and already go depth of human’s daily life and affect our social life. There are movies about AI (artificial intelligence) betray humanity, its remind people to stop and think about the relationship between human and technology.
Utopia in technology means it provides many different ways for us to reach the world, the way we are learning is changing. It leads people to wilder world, social media and political side and broaden the horizons of human. In order to use technology appropriately, we need to remember who is in control, try to enjoy the time and life without technology, return life to basic.
Typography
Typography is a visual art form and a design type phase. It reflects different styles and emotion. When artist used typography in their own work, different types will present themselves in different style. Nowadays, there are thousands typeface in the front family. About the type style, there are bold, Normal Roman, Italic, underline, outline and shadow. When we use typography in an image, the arrangement of grid systems is an important factor to consider, as the position will affect the whole image dramatically.
Serif Font:
- Have strokes, make the individual letters more distinctive
- Usually used in the body of printed works; easier to read and easier for human brains to recognize
- Presents traditional, respectable, comfort (Times New Roman is a commonly used)
Examples that we see in our daily life
Sans Serif Font:
- Shape is less distinctive
- Often used for headings, table text and captions
- Presents clean, modern, stability, objective (Arial is a commonly used)
Examples that we see in our daily life
Principles of Typography (Anatomy of type)
- Point size (Highest and lowest point)
- Cap height
- Serif
- Ascender= X-height (the line above base line)
- Descender (the line below base line)
Text Alignment
- Flush left (most common)
- Ragged right
- Centered
Barbara Kruger
Barbara Kruger is an American conceptual artist. Many of her work was black-and-white photographs and overlaid with white-on-red bold captions. The phases commonly use pronouns such as you, I, your, we and they; it gathers strong resonance and respond from the audience. Besides, she heavily influenced by her years working as a graphic designer after her studies. She had rich skills as a graphic designer; the combination of white-on-red captions with black-and-white photographs really stand-out the typography from the picture and catch viewer’s’ eyes. It also presents a clear meaning and message to audience.
Many of her work is to satirize the society, focus on political, feminist provocations and commentaries on religion, sex, racial and gender stereotypes, consumerism, corporate greed and power (The Art History Archive, 2016)
‘I had to figure out how to bring the world into my world.’ -Barbara Kruger (The Art History Archive, 2016)
Above is a quotes from Barbara Kruger. I am very respect to the artists whose work is related to the world, the environment and the society. They use their abilities, their power and their skills to speak for the disadvantages group in the society, raise the awareness and attention of the problems. They inspired me to use my skills and abilities to do my own interpretation of the society conditions and use photography to record the histories and offering information that people may missed; like the collage that I made in this project, a propaganda to present how Hongkonger fight for their democracy and right.
References
Lois.L (2016) What are utopias and dystopias. Retrieved 1 Mar 2016 Available:http://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/g/the-giver/critical-essays/what-are-utopias-and-dystopias
Singyin.L (2013)Hong Kiat Technology Design Inspiration: 5 Ways “Tech Addiction” Is Changing Human Behaviour. Retrieved 1 Mar 2016 Available: http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/tech-addiction/
The Art History Archive (2016) Barbara Kruger. Retrieved 28 Feb 2016 Available: http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/feminist/Barbara-Kruger.html
Cameron. C (2011) Different typeface and the basics of typographic theory [Photograph] Available: http://www.noupe.com/essentials/icons-fonts/a-crash-course-in-typography-the-basics-of-type.html
CN News (2013) Technology Addiction [Photograph] Available: http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/feminist/Barbara-Kruger.html
Google (2016) The logo of Google [Photograph] Available: https://www.google.co.uk
The Art History Archive (2016) Barbara Kruger’s art work [Photograph] Available: http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/feminist/Barbara-Kruger.html
The Guardian (2016) The logo of The Guardian [Photograph] Available: http://www.theguardian.com/uk
USL (2014) Smartphone Addiction [Photograph] Available: http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/feminist/Barbara-Kruger.html
Visual Hierarchy (2015) SERIF VS SANS SERIF [Photograph] Available: https://visualhierarchy.co/blog/the-difference-between-serif-and-sans-serif/
